Monday, November 30, 2015

As the Christmas season is upon us, J. Warner Wallace of Cold Case Christianity began a series of broadcasts in which he will examine the virgin conception of Jesus. The first installment thinks through the subject questions using the following outline:

Why is the Doctrine of the Virgin Conception Necessary?

The virgin conception is a piece of evidence of Jesus’ as the Messiah.

The virgin conception is an essential explanation of Jesus’ nature.

The virgin conception is an essential truth of God.

Why is the Doctrine of the Virgin Conception Reasonable?

Naturalism is a worldview under examination.

Naturalism therefore should not be a presupposition.

Naturalism accepts at least one extra-natural event.

Naturalism may not, therefore, be an accurate view of the world.

The broadcast can be viewed here. Enjoy and be sure to catch the next installments!

Saturday, November 28, 2015

Sometimes when sharing your faith a great question can be more powerful than an argument. In this brief video Dr. Frank Turek shares what he believes to be the #1 question you should ask those who don't believe.

Friday, November 27, 2015

"One of the most tragic developments of our day is the abandonment of the hard sciences by the Christian community. Teaching our children what the Bible says about creation and giving them a biblical worldview should ignite a renewed interest in biology, geology, astronomy, chemistry and physics...Christian Theists must once again take their place at the forefront of scientific inquiry in pursuit of a better understanding of the world and the God who created it."

Argument: God is all-loving and all-powerful. Therefore, He both can and wants to create a world without suffering. Therefore, it follows that the world has no suffering. But that contradicts 2, Suffering exists. Therefore, God must not exist. 1

Response:

Let us consider assumption 3.

Assumption 3 says, "If God is all powerful, He can create any world that He wants." I would contend that this isn't so if people have free will. Dr. William Lane Craig explains:

"It's logically impossible to make someone do something freely. That is as logically impossible as making a round square or a married bachelor. God's being all-powerful does not mean that He can bring about the logically impossible-indeed, there is not such 'thing' as the logically impossible. It's just an inconsistent combination of words...since it's possible that people have free will, it turns out that 3 is not necessarily true. For if people have free will, they may refuse to do what God desires. So there will be any number of possible words that God cannot create because the people in them wouldn't cooperate with God's desires. In fact, for all we know, it's possible that in any world of free persons with as much good as this world, there would also be as much suffering. This conjecture need not be true or even probable, but so long as it's even logically possible, it shows that it is not necessarily true that God can create any world that He wants. So assumption 3 is just not necessarily true. On this basis alone, the atheist's argument is logically fallacious."2

Next week we will look at assumption 4, "If God is all-loving, He prefers a world without suffering."

Monday, November 23, 2015

In the subject article, Kristen Davis of Doubtless Faith Ministries writes of why the heart, soul, and mind must all be engaged in order to have a deep relationship with God. Below is an excerpt:

Loving God with our minds cannot be separated from loving Him with our hearts, souls and strength. When some part of that is removed it’s not love. It’s either infatuation based on an idea (lack of mind) or infatuation based on information (lacking heart and soul). If we say we love God but don’t care to learn about Him and grow in our depth of knowledge both informational and interpersonal then how can we really say we love God?Happy reading!Stand firm in Christ,Chase

Saturday, November 21, 2015

"Few people witness as much horrific evil as homicide detectives. I’ve certainly seen my share. But what do we really mean when we say something is evil? Are we saying we just don’t like it personally, or are we saying there are some things that are truly, transcendently, objectively evil? Is evil nothing more than a matter of opinion? If so, we could remove all evil by simply changing our minds about what we thought was evil in the first place. If we can’t eliminate evil in this way, we need to think about why and how transcendent notions of evil could exist. While evil might at first appear to be a strong evidence against the existence of an all-powerful, all-loving Divine Creator, it may actually be the best possible evidence for the existence of such a Being. Unless we are prepared to dismiss evil as nothing more than whatever fails to please our private desires or opinions, we’re going to need a transcendent standard of good by which to evaluate and identify anything as evil. As crazy as it might sound at first, the existence of true evil, the kind that transcends each of us as individuals and groups, is dependent on the existence of a true, transcendent standard of good. True evil is evidence for God’s existence."1Courage and Godspeed,ChadHT: The Poached Egg

Friday, November 20, 2015

I was spending time with my wife and girls when I learned of the horrible terrorist attacks in Paris. Many people have an opinion about what causes people to carry out such acts and to behave in such morally deplorable ways and it seems that all "religion" is often demonized as a result.

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

The problem of evil (POE) is considered by many to be the most potent objection to the existence of God. The POE typically comes in three different forms: 1) the logical 2) the evidential 3) and the emotional. Over the next several weeks we will present each version and offer a concise response. This week, we consider the logical version.

Argument: God is all-loving and all-powerful. Therefore, He both can and wants to create a world without suffering. Therefore, it follows that the world has no suffering. But that contradicts 2, Suffering exists. Therefore, God must not exist. 1

Monday, November 16, 2015

Murder investigations go cold when the first detectives fail to act with a sense of urgency. If they wait too long, potential witnesses are harder to locate and evidence is destroyed before it can be recovered. Event as a cold-case detective, I have a similar sense of urgency in my secondary investigation. If I wait too long, my witnesses or suspects may die of old age before I can contact and interview them. To be successful, I have to work within the lifetime of the people involved in my case.

I hope you feel a similar sense of urgency about the evidence in God's "crime scene." Our temporal lives are short and often difficult. Let's act now, while we are on this side of eternity, to make the most important decision of our lives. Let's also help our friends and family to examine the evidence "inside the room" so they can understand the true nature of the universe and the hope we have for a life beyond the grave.

Start an investigation. Examine the evidence. Come to a verdict. Make the case to others.

Saturday, November 14, 2015

In this fast-paced debate, Shabir Ally argues that the Qur'an is a book of peace, while David Wood argues that it isn't. This was one debate in a series of six that Wood and Ally recently participated in.

Friday, November 13, 2015

1. Injustice is No Cure for Injustice
2. Abortion Displaces Oppression without Resolution.
3. It is No Liberation To Kill One Class of Human Beings For The Benefit of Another.
4. Legalized Abortion has made the Safest Place in the World the Most Dangerous Place in the World
5. Abortion Trades Old-school Sexism for New-school Sexism

Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Clive Staples Lewis (1898-1963) enjoyed a distinguished career at Oxford and Cambridge. He was also a notable literary critic and author of science fiction and children's literature (including the Chronicles of Narnia). In addition, Lewis was arguably the most influential Christian apologist of the twentieth century. Remarkably, he was a committed atheist before his conversion to Christ in 1929.

Lewis authored a number of important apologetic works, such as Miracles, The Problem of Pain, God in the Dock, and The Abolition of Man. In his most famous work, Mere Christianity, Lewis presented powerful arguments for the truth of the Christian faith. Originally broadcast as several BBC talks during World War II, Mere Christianity notes that even people who deny objective right and wrong cannot refrain from believing in them. Moreover, people are unable to live out the moral law they know they should. Lewis argued that this moral law, coupled with humanity's inability to fulfill it, allows Christianity to begin to "talk." The forgiveness God offers in Christ makes sense in the real world.

Lewis also maintained that Jesus Christ claimed to be God, undercutting popular notions that Jesus was something like a good teacher. Either He was who He claimed, or else He was a liar or lunatic. But the life of Jesus does not betray the character of a liar or the mentally of a lunatic. Lewis contented that the most reasonable understanding of Jesus is that He is the Lord. 1Courage and Godspeed,ChadFootnote:1. Ted Cabal, "Notable Christian Apologist: C.S. Lewis,"The Apologetics Study Bible, p. 1827.

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

In the subject piece, Tim Barnett of Stand to Reason, tackles the common belief that it doesn’t matter how you come to God, so long as you come. The true God will accept worship—in whatever form and to whatever god—and transpose it onto Himself. On this view, it doesn’t really matter how one worships, as long as the person is sincere. Stand firm in Christ,Chase

Monday, November 09, 2015

Truthbomb Apologetics is proud to be hosting former Planned Parenthood Director turned Pro-life Advocate Abby Johnson as she makes the case for life and equips us to work together to end abortion in our community.

This event will be held on Saturday, November 14th, 2015 at Faith Christian Fellowship in Williamsport, Md from 6:00 pm to 8:30 pm.

This event is free and will feature:

- Q & A time with Abby Johnson
- Local State and Federal Politicians in Attendance and Represented
- Local Pregnancy Centers and Ministry Partners
- Free Resources to Equip You to Make the Case for Life

You can learn more about Abby Johnson and her ministry here. I highly recommend her book and you can learn more about it here.

Saturday, November 07, 2015

"There is no evidence that intelligent people are more likely to be atheists than stupid people, but many atheists simply define belief in God as a sign of stupidity itself. People with bachelor's degrees are somewhat more likely to be atheists than those who do not go beyond high school, but people with advanced degrees are somewhat less likely to be atheists than those with only a bachelor's, and slightly more than half of college professors believe in God.1
Correlation with income is firmer: those who earn more than $150,000 a year are more likely to be atheists.2 Perhaps when you feel materially secure, you feel that you don't need God. Many Christians are anti-intellectual and make bizarre statements about both science and theology. At the same time, many scientists make ignorant arguments about religion. One academic finds it ridiculous to think that 'there's some person sitting on a chair with a beard who has lightning coming out of his fingers or make pronouncements about how people should live.'3 Of course it's ridiculous, as every Christian would agree.

Some of the dullards who have believed in God are the musicians Palestrina and Johann Sebastian Bach; artists such as Leonardo Da Vinci and Caravaggio; writers such as Dante and J.R.R. Tolkien; philosophers such as Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, Rene Descartes, Alfred North Whitehead and Antony Flew; and scientists (I list more of these because anti-theists often claim that religion and science are incompatible) such as Louis Agassiz, Andre-Marie Ampere, Robert Boyle, Tycho Brahe, Nicolaus Copernicus, Georges Cuvier, John Ambrose Fleming, Galileo, Pierre Gassendi, William Harvey, Werner Heisnenberg, William Herschel, James Prescott Joule, William Kelvin, Johann Kepler, Carolus Linnaeus, Joseph Lister, Charles Lyell, James Clark Maxwell, Gregor Mendel, Isaac Newton, Louis Pasteur, Max Planck, Bernhard Riemann and Nicolaus Steno. The anti-theists retort that these people are to old and dead to have been aware that the science disproves God. But here are brilliant people who believe in God today: Stephen M. Barr, Francis S. Collins, Simon Conway Morris, William Lane Craig, Owen Gingerich, Stanley Jaki, John C. Lennox, Alister McGrath, Kenneth Miller, Alvin Plantinga, John Polkinghorne, John A. Pople, Marilynne Robinson, Hugh Ross, Allen R. Sandage, A.N. Wilson and N.T. Wright. And that's just the beginning. At the world's leading research universities a much higher proportion of Christians is to be found in departments of natural science than in departments of humanities or social science. Among the leaders of the anti-theist movement today, few are actually professional scientists."
When one claims that "Intelligent people don't believe God," they are making a demonstrably false statement.

Wednesday, November 04, 2015

"If you’re searching for that perfect line of logic capable of subduing any objection, you’re wasting your time. There is no magic, no silver bullet, no clever turn of thought or phrase that’s guaranteed to compel belief…We have very limited control over how other people respond to us.That’s largely in God’s hands. We can remove some of the negatives or dispel some of the fog—and we ought to try to do both. But at the end of the day, a person’s deep-seated rebellion against God is a problem only a supernatural solution can fix." Courage and Godspeed,Chad